A:     Always, and as promptly as possible.  I put aside a certain amount of work time each day for online interaction, and so far the email has seldom been unmanageable.  If you write to me and don't receive a response, chances are I never received it, or perhaps I accidentally deleted it when I was zipping through the spam.  If you haven't heard back after a week, try again, and just to be on the safe side, put "From a reader" in the subject line, or make reference to a particular book.   If the subject line is "Hi!"  or something of that nature, your email stands a fairly good chance of getting deleted. 

Before writing, please note the following:

• Please browse the FAQ page to see if your question has already been addressed.

• Like most of you, I receive an enormous amount of spam, so please use a subject line that includes the title of the book you'd like to discuss, the name of a character--anything that will make my finger pause on the delete button. A simple "From a reader" will do the job. Warning:  If you jokingly entitle your email something along the lines of, "This is NOT about Viagra," most likely my spam filters will delete it unread.

• Please don't ask me to critique your manuscript or evaluate your story ideas. Like most working writers, I don't read the unpublished work of other writers, not only because of time constraints, but to avoid possible copyright tangles. 

• I do not have, much less sign and send, author photos. The eight-by-ten glossy is a celebrity thing; I'm just a writer, and a camera-shy writer, at that. 

Return to FAQ